INVESTIGATORY ACTIONS

Correction of things which are not wrong and neglecting things which are not right puts the tombstone on any organization or civilization.

This boils down to correct investigation. It is not a slight skill. It is the basic skill behind any intelligent action.

Suppressive Justice

When justice goes astray (as it usually does) the things that have occurred are:

1. Use of justice for some other purpose than public safety (such as maintaining a privileged group or indulging a fixed idea) or

2. Omitted use of investigatory procedure.

All suppressive use of the forces of justice can be traced back to one or the other of these.

Aberrations and hate very often find outlet by calling them “justice” or “law and order.” This is why it can be said that man cannot be trusted with justice.

This or just plain stupidity bring about a neglect of intelligent investigatory procedures. Yet all group sanity depends upon correct and unaberrated (rational) investigatory procedures. Only in that way can one establish causes of things. And only by establishing causes can one cease to be the effect of unwanted situations.

It is one thing to be able to observe. It is quite another to utilize observations so that one can get to the basis of things.

Sequences

Investigations become necessary in the face of outpoints or pluspoints.

Investigations can occur out of idle curiosity or particular interest. They can also occur to locate the cause of pluspoints.

Whatever the motive for investigation, the action itself is conducted by sequences.

If one is incapable mentally of tracing a series of events or actions, one cannot investigate.

Altered sequence is a primary block to investigation.

At first glance, omitted data would seem to be the block. On the contrary, it is the end product of an investigation and is what pulls an investigation along—one is looking for omitted data.

An altered sequence of actions defeats any investigation. Examples: We will hang him and then conduct a trial. We will assume who did it and then find evidence to prove it. A crime should be provoked to find who commits them.

Any time an investigation gets back-to-front, it will not succeed.

Thus, if an investigator himself has any trouble with seeing or visualizing sequences of actions, he will inevitably come up with the wrong answer.

Reversely, when one sees that someone has come up with a wrong or incomplete answer, one can assume that the investigator has trouble with sequences of events or, of course, did not really investigate.

One can’t really credit that Sherlock Holmes would say, “I have here the fingerprint of Mr. Murgatroyd on the murder weapon. Have the police arrest him. Now, Watson, hand me a magnifying glass and ask Sgt. Doherty to let us look over his fingerprint files.”

If one cannot visualize a series of actions, like a ball bouncing down a flight of stairs, or if one cannot relate in proper order several different actions with one object into a proper sequence, he will not be able to investigate.

If one can, that’s fine.

Investigations

All betterment of life depends on finding out pluspoints and why and reinforcing them, locating outpoints and why and eradicating them.

This is the successful survival pattern of living. A primitive who is going to survive does just that and a scientist who is worth anything does just that.

The fisherman sees sea gulls clustering over a point on the sea. That’s the beginning of a short sequence, point number one. He predicts a school of fish, point number two. He sails over as sequence point number three. He looks down as sequence point number four. He sees fish as point number five. He gets out a net as point number six. He circles the school with the net, number seven. He draws in the net, number eight. He brings the fish on board, number nine. He goes to port, number ten. He sells the fish, number eleven. That’s following a pluspoint—cluster of sea gulls.

A sequence from an outpoint might be: Housewife serves dinner. Nobody eats the cake, number one; she tastes it, number two; she recognizes soap in it, number three. She goes to kitchen, number four. She looks into cupboard, number five. She finds the soapbox upset, number six. She sees the flour below it, number seven. She sees cookie jar empty, number eight. She grabs young son, number nine. She shows him the setup, number ten. She gets a confession, number eleven. And number twelve is too painful to describe.

Discoveries

All discoveries are the end product of a sequence of investigatory actions that begin with either a pluspoint or an outpoint.

Thus all knowledge proceeds from pluspoints or outpoints observed.

And all knowledge depends on an ability to investigate.

And all investigation is done in correct sequence.

And all successes depend upon the ability to do these things.

a departure from rational thought or behavior; irrational thought or conduct. It means basically to err, to make mistakes, or more specifically to have fixed ideas which are not true. The word is also used in its scientific sense. It means departure from a straight line. If a line should go from A to B, then if it is aberrated it would go from A to some other point, to some other point, to some other point, to some other point, to some other point, and finally arrive at B. Taken in this sense, it would also mean the lack of straightness or to see crookedly as, for example, a man sees a horse but thinks he sees an elephant. Aberrated conduct would be wrong conduct, or conduct not supported by reason. Aberration is opposed to sanity, which would be its opposite. From the Latin, aberrare, to wander from; Latin, ab, away, errare, to wander.

Sherlock Holmes, a fictional English detective of the nineteenth century, created by English author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930). Holmes’s extraordinary powers of observation, memory and deduction through purely scientific reasoning enabled him to identify criminals and solve mysteries in cases that had left all other detectives baffled. He often explains his reasoning to his partner and best friend, Dr. Watson, who is also the narrator of the stories.